How to Do Stuff With Ethanhttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com
I learned the hard way so you won't have toMon, 18 Feb 2019 22:10:55 +0000en-UShourly1https://i1.wp.com/www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/cropped-ethan-icon.jpg?fit=32%2C32How to Do Stuff With Ethanhttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com
3232140851323Playing Hunter’s Chorus on the Violin (Video)http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/playing-hunters-chorus-on-the-violin-video/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/playing-hunters-chorus-on-the-violin-video/#respondMon, 18 Feb 2019 22:10:46 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29840Spending time at home on Family Day and playing some violin.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/playing-hunters-chorus-on-the-violin-video/feed/029840Unschooling Journal February 10-16, 2019 – Snow and Constant Learninghttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-10-16-2019-snow-and-constant-learning/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-10-16-2019-snow-and-constant-learning/#respondSun, 17 Feb 2019 06:59:06 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29691What happened this past week. February 10 February 11 Ethan and Dong Eun had an interesting talk about what makes something alive. Out of curiosity, Dong Eun asked if the planets and stars are alive. Ethan said that it depends on what you consider alive. Ethan explained the different definitions of “alive.” Dong Eun asked […]

February 10

We went grocery shopping at Costco today and Ethan brought along a few cubes. Here, he was counting how many moves were needed to solve the 3×3. I think he said 93.

He also had his mini whiteboard and drew some 3D shapes.

Back home, he played with his Snap Circuits set.

Snow! Time to head out and play with his buddy, Kal.

They built a snow wall.

Wall complete. They spent the rest of the time throwing snowballs and snow at each other.

Somebody drew a cute happy face onto our van!

February 11

Ethan and Dong Eun had an interesting talk about what makes something alive. Out of curiosity, Dong Eun asked if the planets and stars are alive.

Ethan said that it depends on what you consider alive. Ethan explained the different definitions of “alive.” Dong Eun asked what being alive meant and she said that something alive might have energy in order to come to life.

Ethan said some rocks have potential energy to roll down a hill but they’re not alive.

They talked about what else can define being alive.

Ethan said that maybe whether or not something can grow could be alive, but Dong Eun said that at the start of the solar system, everything clumped together to form planets and stars.

She asked if that should be a definition of being alive?

Ethan said that the earth is constantly being bombarded by meteorites and is growing but that doesn’t mean that the earth is alive.

Ethan finally suggested that something alive is something that can reproduce.

They finished the conversation with Dong Eun wanting to think more about Ethan’s last point and find a counterpoint.

She couldn’t find something to argue against Ethan’s point so they decided that perhaps Ethan’s definition of being alive is the most logical explanation.

Dong Eun said that even in humans, if our cells are no longer reproducing, we can’t live.

Talking about what’s “alive” over breakfast.

They went down to the beach. Ethan brought a shovel and threw snow into the ocean to see what would happen. The snow turned into slushy ice.

They went to the skatepark and Ethan slid down the “slides.”

Ethan made a snowman.

They came home and went out into our tennis court to play with the snow.

They made this giant heart.

Back home, Ethan listened to π played on the piano. He was looking for violin and piano music when he found this song. They used the numbers from π and matched them up with notes.

He wanted to try playing the song from π on his violin so he wrote out the notes himself. The notes are D3 = 0 until E4 = 9. And you’re supposed to assigned each note to a letter in the alphabet.

Ethan taught Dong Eun the Fibonacci sequence.

He found a video with someone who turned the Fibonacci sequence into a song.

He wrote out the first 30 Fibonacci numbers.

It started snowing again.

Ethan and Dong Eun listened to Vivaldi Four Seasons: Winter. This version had the story behind the song.

They listened as they watched the snow falling and could relate to the music better because they understood how Vivaldi was inspired by the winter.

Ethan made element number 48, cadmium, for his giant periodic table.

He learned about similar triangles, how triangles that are different in size can have angles that are the same or the ratio between the sides of triangles can be the same.

He practiced some adjectives after reading a story in Canadian Reader.

He learned about phrases and clauses.

He wrote an explanation of what phrases are.

He continued learning about the Byzantine Empire and wrote about what he learned.

He finished the night with some coding and read some questions and answers on the xkcd.com site.

February 12

Snow day again!

After breakfast, Ethan cleared the sidewalk… No, just kidding. He was on his way to the playground to play with his friend.

The two of them made snow forts.

And they threw more than a few snowballs at each other.

Back home, Ethan learned about bearings, or how to show direction.

He explained how to find the distance of an airplane when you know the distance between two points and the bearing of the airplane from those points.

He practiced violin and when he went to class, his teacher said that he has now officially completed Suzuki Book 1. Ethan was very proud of his achievement.

For language arts, he learned about dangling modifiers.

Ethan helped clear the snow from Juju Jr. before going to his taekwondo and violin classes.

When he got home, he explained dangling modifiers.

He finished the night reading questions and answers on the xkcd.com site.

February 13

Wow! Another beautiful, sunny day with snow covering everything. It was certainly magical.

We had a call with Natasha, Ethan’s SelfDesign LC (Learning Consultant), as part of the winter reflection report she was preparing. The reflection is sort of like a progress report but it follows the learning principles created by SelfDesign. Ethan did a good job explaining what he’s been doing and was also good with answering questions.

February 15

Ethan practiced solving for a variable in an equation this morning.

Ethan loves Escape From Mr. Lemoncello’s Library so we tried to find similar books. So we looked at the ebooks available from the library and found a few books that Ethan liked.

More solving equations.

He practiced the violin, as usual.

Today, he watched a live show of Astronomy Cast on YouTube but he didn’t know about some of the things they talked about so he watched previous episodes to catch up.

He answered comprehension questions from an article in Canadian Reader.

Ethan started working on his big periodic table of the elements again. He planned to do more than one today to finish the row. This is tellurium.

He answered comprehension questions about the Byzantine Empire.

He wrote about what understatements and overstatements are.

Ethan also read Mr. Lemoncello’s Great Library Race and Library Olympics today. He finished both books in a couple of hours and Dong Eun asked how he reads so fast. He said that he skims and then he re-reads to catch more details.

He practiced violin again after dinner.

And he also completed six elements today, which included tellurium, iodine, xenon, caesium, barium and hafnium.

He said that he wanted to get to the fun, radioactive elements so that’s why he wanted to do more of them today.

February 16

Ethan was supposed to have symphony practice and skating lessons but there was no class this week because of Family Day.

However, we didn’t know about symphony class until we arrived at the community centre. We decided to hang out and go to the library instead.

While waiting for the library to open, Ethan kept himself busy with some Rubik’s Cubes.

We decided to make a timelapse video of Ethan solving the 8×8 cube.

We then spent some time at the library. Ethan read some Diary of a Wimpy Kid books.

We had put Mr. Lemony Snickett’s Library Olympics on hold and it was ready to be picked up. Ethan had already read it the day before in ebook format…twice. He was still happy to read it again and said that he preferred the real book version.

We went for a walk along the beach before picking up some pizza and veggies to make dinner at home.

After dinner, we finished watching Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. Now we’re just waiting for Episodes I and II to be ready for pick up at the library.

Ethan completed another element, cerium.

Another week and we’re now into mid-February. We can see how Ethan has continued to progress in his learning.

Our call with Ethan’s LC, Natasha, helped reassure us that Ethan is doing well and to keep letting him lead the way in his learning.

That’s sort of the whole idea of SelfDesign and unschooling and it’s something we’re very happy about because of how happy Ethan is.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-10-16-2019-snow-and-constant-learning/feed/029691Timelapse Video of Solving the 8×8 Rubik’s Cubehttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/timelapse-video-of-solving-the-8x8-rubiks-cube/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/timelapse-video-of-solving-the-8x8-rubiks-cube/#respondSun, 17 Feb 2019 06:56:23 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29823We were waiting for the library to open and decided to make a timelapse video of Ethan solving the 8×8 Rubik’s Cube.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/timelapse-video-of-solving-the-8x8-rubiks-cube/feed/029823Unschooling Journal February 3-9, 2019 – Familyhttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-3-9-2019-family/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-3-9-2019-family/#respondSun, 10 Feb 2019 06:43:14 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29575The first week of February included Lunar New Year so we spent time with family, but much of Ethan’s week was as busy as usual. It never ceases to amaze us what Ethan does and learns as he continues on his unschooling journey. February 3 February 4 February 5 February 6 Today was nature school […]

]]>The first week of February included Lunar New Year so we spent time with family, but much of Ethan’s week was as busy as usual. It never ceases to amaze us what Ethan does and learns as he continues on his unschooling journey.

February 3

Ethan cooked the scrambled eggs we had for breakfast this Sunday morning. It was actually snowing and he was excited about that, but the snow didn’t last long. Eggs were great, though.

Ethan checked out xkcd.com, the “What If?” book author’s site, as they have more recent questions and answers there.

Ethan practiced solving his 8×8 Rubik’s Cube but only for a short time.

The Empire Strikes Back became more interesting than the cube. Ethan loved watching the movie and eating his lunch from the coffee table, something we normally never do.

After the movie, Ethan did some music notation homework.

After staying home all morning and watching the movie, we headed out for a walk and to pick up some groceries. Ethan was busy trying to gather enough snow to make a snowball.

After we got home, Ethan and I played Gravity Maze.

And then we played some chess, something we haven’t done in a while.

We watched Return of the Jedi to complete the Star Wars trilogy. Ethan got to have his dinner at the coffee table, which he again liked. After the movie, Ethan had some dessert and read about the Colosseum. He spent some more time on the xkcd.com site before getting ready for bed.

February 4

Ethan started the day checking out the xkcd.com website again. The question he was looking at was about how long it would take a 7kg bowling ball to reach the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

It was another beautiful day out, so Ethan and Dong Eun went to the beach.

Ethan plotted a graph in the sand.

Back home, Ethan learned about finding missing angles.

He worked on slides to help him with a video he wanted to make about finding missing angles.

Heading outside to play.

Learning about the moon from Classroom Ready Science News.

He learned about the decline of the Roman Empire today.

And he wrote a story describing the decline of the Roman Empire.

He learned about relative clauses and wrote a fun story to illustrate how to use relative clauses. Notice the joke in the drawing?

Today’s element that he worked on was technetium.

He also learned about inverse trigonometric functions today and taught what he learned to Dong Eun.

He then worked on remixing a game in Scratch before we read Math Explained with Bad Drawings.

He wanted me to record the parts that he liked so he could listen again on his own.

February 5

It’s been colder here for sure, but these sunny days have been amazing. Ethan and Dong Eun spent the morning outside enjoying the beautiful weather.

Ethan always finds a way to entertain himself at the beach.

He made a sort of track to walk on but there are dead ends. The track goes all the way until the end of the beach that we can see in the photo.

He has started up his 60-second workout challenge again.

He learned about inverse trigonomic functions.

He learned about photosynthesis.

He practiced violin.

He learned about personal pronouns.

He then wrote a fun story using personal pronouns.

Ethan made FIVE videos today about inverse trigonometric functions.

The element he made today was atomic number 44, ruthenium.

He worked on remixing a platform game in Scratch.

And he went outside to play with his friends.

He had taekwondo class and violin class. His violin teacher said that he could start learning a new song, Musette. Ethan was very excited about that.

He worked on his music notation homework.

He then spent the last part of the night working out again and reading some of the questions from xkcd.com. The question he read tonight was about what would happen if a powerful jet of water could be continuously aimed at the sun. Interestingly, the sun would get hotter!

February 6

Today was nature school day so we only saw Ethan when he came home. He was very tired. According to his fitness tracker, he walked over 12,000 steps today.

Since he was tired and hungry early, we went out for sushi.

February 7

Ethan and Dong Eun went for another walk along the beach this morning. We’re really fortunate to live so close to the water.

There were all kinds of water birds gathered today.

Ethan worked on rhodium for his element today.

Ethan learned about sequences today for math and taught us what he learned.

Practiced violin.

And learned more about math while having his snack.

He learned about auxiliary verbs today.

Ethan drew arrows on this mini Rubik’s Cube to turn it into a super cube. You can only move the pieces in the direction of the arrows, which makes solving the cube much harder.

Answering questions about Rome and the interesting or unique things that they did in ancient Rome.

He went out to play with his friends.

And he learned about prepositions.

He did some work on a platform game in Scratch.

He wrote a story using prepositions.

Later on, Ethan had his taekwondo class and after dinner, he watched Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

February 8

Ethan got to work this morning and tried to finish up his tasks early because we were going out early. He learned about the Byzantine Empire today.

He wrote a story about the Byzantine Empire.

He learned about compound-complex sentences and wrote an explanation for what they are.

For math, he learned about chords and cyclic quadrilaterals.

And he practiced violin, too.

Ethan came to my client’s office with me today and continued his work. He started with simple and compound sentences.

He also worked on a Canadian Reader article and learned about using quotation marks.

He also finished making the next element in the periodic table, silver.

I was at my client’s to take some headshots for some new team members so I took the opportunity to take one of Ethan, too.

Amy loves it when Ethan comes to visit. She loves kids and Ethan likes talking to her, too. He showed her how to make the paper airplane that set the Guinness World Record for distance.

They tried out the plane in the hallway.

We met with my parents, sister and cousin for Chinese New Year dinner.

Once we got home, Ethan used some electrical tape and cut arrows to stick onto my old Rubik’s Cube from the 80s to make a super cube. We were going to try and buy some arrow stickers but Ethan found his own solution.

And before he went to bed, he got to number 71 on his Perplexus puzzle.

February 9

Ethan made another super cube. This time, he used his 4×4 cube and again, cut out the arrows from electrical tape.

Ethan had skating lessons and had a great time. He’s progressing quite well and was practicing crossovers today.

For lunch, we headed to A&W because everyone was craving A&W.

Ethan received a Wal-Mart gift card for Christmas so we decided to find a new board game.

He also checked his blood pressure. He was fine, btw

He got the latest issue of Bark!, a magazine that the BCSPCA puts out for kids. Ethan has a free subscription because of the money he donated last year after our yard sale.

He wanted to learn about the algorithm to solve the 2×4 cube.

He watched about half of Rogue One before getting ready for bed. We read from the xkcd.com website and recorded it so he could listen anytime he wants.

And that was Ethan’s week! He had a busy week with a lot of outdoors time because of the great weather.

I talked about Ethan’s experience as an unschooler to a couple of parents this week and felt grateful that we can do this with Ethan. It’s great being able to spend so much time with him as a child, especially because he’s now 10 and growing up fast.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-february-3-9-2019-family/feed/029575What are inverse trig functions – 5 Part Video Serieshttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/what-are-inverse-trig-functions-5-part-video-series/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/what-are-inverse-trig-functions-5-part-video-series/#respondWed, 06 Feb 2019 07:40:06 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29633Ethan learned about inverse trig functions today and made a big long video about them. But instead of publishing one big long video, he did some editing and made five shorter videos. Each video has a practice problem. Here they are…

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/what-are-inverse-trig-functions-5-part-video-series/feed/029633Unschooling Journal January 27 to February 2, 2019 – The Beachhttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-january-27-to-february-2-2019-the-beach/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-january-27-to-february-2-2019-the-beach/#respondSun, 03 Feb 2019 10:10:04 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29432Here’s Ethan’s last week of January 2019 and all his unschooling adventures. We started the week with a chill Sunday at home and at the beach. January 27 We started the day by going for a jog along the beach. January 28 There were other things he did today, too, such as playing the violin, […]

]]>Here’s Ethan’s last week of January 2019 and all his unschooling adventures. We started the week with a chill Sunday at home and at the beach.

January 27

We started the day by going for a jog along the beach.

After watching Solo: A Star Wars Story, we went out for a walk along the beach again because it was such a beautiful day out.

Ethan loves the beach. He always finds things to do with just a stick.

He wrote stomp in the sand and then jumped around, stomping, of course

He then started drawing frames/borders around footprints.

He also drew or wrote inside the footprints.

After we got home, we played a few games of Monopoly Deal, UNO and Bears vs Babies.

After dinner, Ethan watched a NOVA program about robots and finished his night by watching The Secret Life of Pets. Definitely a chill Sunday.

January 28

Ethan learned about loci today and explained what they are to Dong Eun.

Ethan made a card for strontinium for his big periodic table.

He also cleaned his room today.

He worked on a Canadian Reader story about the massive cave discovered in BC.

Ethan learned about Roman law today.

He wrote about how Roman law influenced our modern day laws.

And he also taught Dong Eun about Roman law.

He learned about complex sentences.

Looks like he needs some more practice with complex sentences.

He wrote a story explaining what complex sentences are.

Ethan successfully completed his 60-second exercise challenge for 28 days and received his new 8×8 Rubik’s Cube.

He was definitely happy and proud.

He made a super flip pattern with his 7×7. He didn’t want to start solving the 8×8, yet.

But then he mixed up the 8×8 and was able to solve it pretty quickly. He said that if you can solve the 4×4 and 5×5 cubes, you can solve any cube.

He made a heart shape pattern for Dong Eun.

Ethan’s tooth finally fell out this morning and Ethan was prepared to leave his tooth for the tooth fairy. But just before bed, he had second thoughts and decided to leave a note for the tooth fairy asking if she could not take his tooth. He offered her an apple, instead. we read the apple is one of her favourite foods, so…

There were other things he did today, too, such as playing the violin, editing and uploading a new video to YouTube about Rubik’s Cube combinations and reading a book about Roman soldiers.

January 29

UPDATE: Ethan and Dong Eun took a walk this morning along the beach and took notice of all the birds that were there. Ethan observed their behaviour as there were many birds there.

Ethan wrote most of the descriptions, except the ones that are capitalized correctly.

in the morning, Ethan got a note from the tooth fairy saying thanks for the apple, and she also left the tooth!

after that, he did his math, how to “solve for a variable”.

khan academy video again.

after this, he explained his math to Dong Eun on the chalkboard. we think the chalkboard is very good, for teaching… and drawing!

after that, he did his violin. he practiced the happy farmer, Gossec Gavotte, and his new one, chorus from judas maccabaeus.

Ethan worked on some grammar in Khan Academy about idioms.

Ethan wrote a fun story using as many idioms as he could.

An idioms list he found.

Ethan worked on another element for his big periodic table: Yttrium

Ethan practiced the violin.

And he went out to play.

After taekwondo and violin class, Ethan came home and did his music notation homework.

Today’s word of the day was woot.

Ethan was reading his periodic table book and told me about the composition of the universe.

January 30

Ethan went to nature school today and wanted photos of his jacket

Ethan learned about the three ways to construct a triangle.

Ethan completed his 40th element for the big periodic table, which was zirconium.

Ethan practiced Chorus from Judas Maccabaeus on the violin.

He also did his music notation homework.

And today’s word of the day was cybersquatting.

After dinner, we went ice skating. Ethan has really improved since taking skating lessons.

After the public skating session was over, there was a youth hockey league game so we stayed and watched. Ethan really enjoyed watching and dancing when the music came on during stoppages in play.

January 31

UPDATE: This morning, Dong Eun and Ethan went for a jog along the seawall and stopped to watch the birds again.

A busy day that started with learning about solving simultaneous equations.

Then it was practicing Gavotte on the violin.

He learned about the sound of language, things like oxymorons and onomatopoeia.

He wrote about what onomatopoeia is.

For history, he learned about the rise of Christianity and wrote about that, too.

His “element of the day” was niobium. He also looked online to see what niobium is used for. He found out that it’s used in memory chips because it’s an excellent conductor.

Coding on Scratch.

He worked on remixing a platform game.

He played around with making patterns on his Rubik’s Cubes.

Spiral pattern.

The flower pattern.

The E pattern. No, actually, Ethan made his name on the 8×8 cube on his own without any help or tutorials.

He had taekwondo earlier and I noticed that he was constantly brushing his bangs away. He also noticed and decided to cut his bangs… on his own, again.

February 1

Today’s element of the day for Ethan’s big periodic table was molybdenum.

He practiced simultaneous equations.

And he taught us about solving simultaneous equations.

Practiced the same math on Khan Academy.

He did a quiz about solving simultaneous equations.

He learned about climate change for his science work today.

Ethan created a mind map to explain climate change to Dong Eun.

He made an animated video about climate change.

Ethan practiced the violin.

He then learned about simple and compound sentences.

And then he wrote a story using compound sentences.

Ethan learned about Emperor Constantine and wrote about him.

He did a comprehension exercise for an article about Lunar New Year.

February 2

Ethan had his symphony class this morning.

In between symphony class and skating lessons, Ethan played at the community centre and also worked on his 8×8 Rubik’s Cube.

He’s really improving his skating and having fun, too.

It was a beautiful day out so we went for a walk to the beach.

We were having a family dinner later in the evening and we needed some lucky red envelopes for Ethan’s cousins. We didn’t have any so Ethan made them.

One of his cousins didn’t get her Christmas present is why we have a Merry Christmas envelope.

And since it’s going to be the Year of the Pig, Ethan made an origami pig to put on our front door.

Family dinner!

We could see the aurora tonight, which was very cool, even though it was cloudy.

After all the cleaning up, which Ethan helped with, we finished off the day by watching Star Wars: A New Hope.

What a busy week, as usual. Ethan loves to spend time doing the things he enjoys. We asked again if he’d like to go back to regular school and again, he said no. Unschooling has really been a great thing for him… and us as a family, too.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-january-27-to-february-2-2019-the-beach/feed/029432how to make the letter “a” on a 7×7 or higher (VIDEO)http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/how-to-make-the-letter-a-on-a-7x7-or-higher-video/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/how-to-make-the-letter-a-on-a-7x7-or-higher-video/#respondSat, 02 Feb 2019 23:37:16 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29565This video is about making the letter “a” on a 7×7 or higher. in the video, I say you can make it only on a 8×8 or higher, but you can make it on a 7×7.if you already know how to make the dot(aka flower,aka donut)pattern on the 3×3, go to 3:19. if you know […]

]]>This video is about making the letter “a” on a 7×7 or higher. in the video, I say you can make it only on a 8×8 or higher, but you can make it on a 7×7.if you already know how to make the dot(aka flower,aka donut)pattern on the 3×3, go to 3:19. if you know how to make the dot(aka flower,aka donut) pattern on the 7×7 or higher, go to 3:30.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/how-to-make-the-letter-a-on-a-7x7-or-higher-video/feed/029565What’s Global Warming and How to Prevent It – Videohttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/whats-global-warming-and-how-to-prevent-it-video/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/whats-global-warming-and-how-to-prevent-it-video/#respondSat, 02 Feb 2019 06:25:30 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29548A video about global warming and how to prevent it.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/whats-global-warming-and-how-to-prevent-it-video/feed/029548Rubik’s Cube Combinations Videohttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/rubiks-cube-combinations-video/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/rubiks-cube-combinations-video/#respondTue, 29 Jan 2019 07:01:34 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29472Ethan edited a new video today about Rubik’s Cube combinations. He made the video a few weeks ago but just got around to editing it. It was a 30+ minute long video but he made it into three smaller videos.

]]>Ethan edited a new video today about Rubik’s Cube combinations. He made the video a few weeks ago but just got around to editing it. It was a 30+ minute long video but he made it into three smaller videos.

]]>http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/rubiks-cube-combinations-video/feed/029472Unschooling Journal January 20-26, 2019 – Paper Airplanes & Periodic Tableshttp://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-january-20-26-2019-paper-airplanes-periodic-tables/
http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/unschooling-journal-january-20-26-2019-paper-airplanes-periodic-tables/#respondSun, 27 Jan 2019 22:40:45 +0000http://www.howtodostuffwithethan.com/?p=29298Here’s another week of Ethan and unschooling. He had a major project involving the periodic table of elements, as well as learning about how to make paper airplanes that break Guinness World Records. January 20 Ethan also did two 60-second workouts today, even though he was very tired from the day’s activities. January 21 January […]

]]>Here’s another week of Ethan and unschooling. He had a major project involving the periodic table of elements, as well as learning about how to make paper airplanes that break Guinness World Records.

January 20

Ethan started the day by editing a video he’s been working on about

More chalkboard messages between Ethan and Dong Eun.

Ethan was folding more paper airplanes today, since he had so much fun with them yesterday, and was curious about how to make his planes fly straight. I suggested that he Google it and he found a video about the person who designed the paper airplane that holds the Guiness World Record for longest distance by a paper airplane.

The person’s name is John M. Collins and he has instructional videos for some of his most popular paper airplanes, including the world record plane. What’s unique about Collins is that he combines aerodynamics and flight mechanics with origami. Ethan was very intrigued, especially because he knew what the origami folds were that Collins described so Ethan was able to easily follow the instructions. Ethan spent the rest of the morning folding different paper airplane designs.

In the afternoon, Ethan went to a birthday party for his friend Nico.

The party was at Mt. Seymour and it featured snow tubing as the main activity.

It was a perfect day for tubing and a party.

Ethan had a blast blasting down the hill in the tube.

The party continued inside a special yurt with a donut eating game. They hung mini donuts on strings and the kids had to eat them off with only their mouths.

Ethan only knew Nico and his little brother Paulo because the kids at the party were all from Nico’s class. He had his party together with a girl from class who’s birthday is also around the same time and both their moms wanted a snow tubing party.

He was able to connect with a couple of the Korean kids.

The other kid’s name was Jasmine. Jasmine’s mom made this amazing cake for the party.

After eating and while waiting for the cake to be served, Ethan pulled out his Rubik’s Cubes and got a few of the other kids to scramble them so he could solve them.

After we got home, Ethan continued working on paper airplanes.

He also spent some time solving his 6×6 Rubik’s Cube. We also talked about the number of combinations that a 5×5 and 7×7 cube have. For reference, the 5×5 has more combinations than all the atoms that make up our universe.

We were able to see the super blood wolf moon and get this photo of it.

Ethan also did two 60-second workouts today, even though he was very tired from the day’s activities.

January 21

This is a kid with a violin book sticking out of his head. Or it’s also Ethan holding the paper airplane that set the world record for distance. This was the design he learned how to make yesterday and he made it again today to try outside.

Ethan then learned about quadratic graphs from his math textbook.

He also watched a video about quadratic graphs on Khan Academy and then he explained quadratic graphs to Dong Eun.

Ethan continued learning about ancient Rome and Julius Caesar.

He retold what he learned in his own words.

He watched a Crash Course video again about the Roman Empire to refresh his memory.

For science, Ethan decided to learn about the periodic table of elements… just for fun.

He decided to make his own periodic table… also just for fun. He ended up spending several hours on it because he had to cut out each square and write the elements onto them.

Completed periodic table with legend, too. We are going to get a magnetic sheet that Ethan can cut up and stick onto each element. He wants to put the periodic onto our fridge.

For language arts, he learned about the dash.

He also learned about interjections and wrote a story using them.

He finished the day by doing a Scratch coding project called a spiralizer. A ball in the centre clones itself and turns according to the angle setting. The cloned balls move away from the centre at a certain speed. The speed setting controls how fast the ball moves away. The pensize setting controls how thick or thin the lines are that the ball makes as it moves outward.

The balls looks like they are spiraling, but they are actually just moving outward.

Ethan also did the lesson on banning plastic straws again. He didn’t do this particular assingment before so he did it today.

January 22

Today was an interesting day. Ethan only worked on the periodic table of elements, but in a much larger scale.

Ethan started the day by setting up his periodic table again since the elements aren’t stuck to the card.

Ethan wanted to make a larger version of the periodic table of elements because he wanted to draw the atoms that make up each element. Dong Eun then suggested that he stick the elements onto the wall so we could see them all at once.

Ethan took some time to practice violin. This is from Suzuki Book 2 and he practiced Chorus from Judas Maccabaeus.

He went back to working on his big periodic table and found a periodic table song on YouTube.

The song uses the “Can-Can” music by Offenbach.

Ethan worked all day on this project.

This was taken just before 5:30 pm.

Each card has the atomic number, mass and includes the exact number of electrons, neutrons and protons.

Ethan had taekwondo class and violin class. He was anxious to get back home to continue working on his periodic table. First, he did his music notation homework.

Electrons, protons and neutrons drawn for another element, copper.

And here is where he finished off today.

January 23

Ethan woke up a little earlier this morning and played around with this periodic table.

He spent the day at nature school. He was very excited about going, as he is every week.

Back home, Ethan practiced violin.

After violin practice, he learned about histograms and created a couple to show us.

Next, he modified a game in Scratch. The object is to move the green ball onto the two pillars.

He then worked on his big periodic table project by watching/listening to the periodic table song on YouTube.

Bit of a late dinner before doing some reading.

January 24

Ethan started the day by learning about vectors.

He learned about adding vectors and demonstrated what he learned.

And he also told us about multiplying vectors.

Ethan practiced playing Take Your Partners on the violin.

He then continued learning about the Roman Empire and read about Emperor Augustus.

He drew this little comic about Emperor Augustus. Augustus is confused because he doesn’t know why people are shouting E.A.

He watched a video on Khan Academy about Augustus.

He then wrote a story about Augustus.

Next, Ethan learned about comparative and superlative adjectives.

He scored 100% on the quiz.

He then wrote a fun story using comparative and superlative adjectives.

Lately, he can’t put this book down. He reads it all the time.

Heading out to play with friends.

After dinner, Ethan did some coding in Scratch.

The magnetic sheet arrived. Ethan spent the rest of the evening cutting and sticking magnets to his periodic table cards.

He stuck the periodic table onto the fridge.

Periodic table all stuck on the fridge.

A very loose tooth! We tried to help Ethan get it out, but it was a bit more stubborn than we thought.

January 25

Ethan learned about sectors today for math.

He learned how to calculate the area of a sector and explained it to Dong Eun.

He took a quiz about the area of a sector.

And it looks like he needs some more practice.

Next up was history and he continued learning about the Roman Empire. He learned about how the Colosseum was built.

He wrote a story about the Romans.

And then he explained what he learned about the Romans to Dong Eun.

Ethan read an article about killer whales and answered some comprehension questions.

He practiced violin by playing Chorus from Judas Maccabaeus.

He also did some musical notation homework.

Next, Ethan did language arts and learned about articles.

He watched a video lesson about articles on Khan Academy.

And scored 100% of the articles quiz.

He then wrote a story to explain how to use articles.

Next, he did some coding in Scratch.

And he completed one more element for his giant periodic table. Today, it was rubidium.

We ordered a periodic table book that arrived today.

Ethan learned how to solve the Square One cube. He also wrote out how to solve this cube onto a bunch of flashcards. He turned the flashcards into a kind of book by punching a hole through them and joining the cards together with a binder ring.

After dinner, it was time for family game night!

We also all went jogging this morning and Ethan did his 60-second workouts, too.

January 26

Ethan had his violin symphony class this morning. While waiting for skating lessons, Ethan practiced solving his Squared One cube.

Skating lessons.

Practicing skating backwards. He had a great time at skating and seems to be really enjoying the lessons.

We stopped at the library on the way home. We borrowed some books on the Roman Empire to tie in with what he had been learning this past week.

He has been doing some eye exercises from a YouTube video. Today, he wrote them down so he wouldn’t have to use the video.

He wanted to learn more about quadratic formulas.

The library books we borrowed.

A video about quadratic formulas.

Now it was time to teach quadratic formula to Dong Eun.

Taking a quiz on quadratic formulas.

He then practiced violin.

He learned about determiners but wasn’t sure what they were. So we read this together and I explained them to him.

More learning about determiners.

We did our 60-second exercise challenge.

Ethan explained what determiners are.

He than did some coding in Scratch before we went out for dinner with my parents.

After dinner, we came home and watched Star Wars Episode 8: The Last Jedi before Ethan went to bed and the week was done.

So another week of learning and unschooling for Ethan. He again did a lot of math but also did some chemistry by working on the periodic table.

He’s also closer to completing the 60-second exercise challenge so he’s excited about getting closer to getting his new Rubik’s Cube.